Episode 1: Athens
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Naxos
18 September 2005
– 1 October 2005What do you do to celebrate a
significant anniversary, especially if you were one of
three Burnham siblings who married in 1965 and are still
happily married? You celebrate together. We did just that
at a Club Med in Cancun Mexico for our 25th anniversary
and it was so successful we planned a 40th anniversary
gathering in the Greek Islands. It seems the Greek
Islands are a popular destination for couples getting
married, so what better place to celebrate an anniversary.
September 18, 2005 found Ray and me on an overnight
flight to Gatwick, England, via Halifax, Nova Scotia,
where we picked up the Saint John, New Brunswick
contingent, Jack and Jenni Burnham and Carolyn and Lorie
Demmings. I researched places to stay in Greece, Jack had
found the best airline prices and Carolyn came up with
accommodation for overnight in Gatwick. Zoom to Gatwick
with a connection the next morning on Easyjet to Athens,
Greece was the economical choice and it worked very well.
We had four nights in Athens before taking the ferries to
the Cycladic Islands, where we stayed one week each on
Naxos and Santorini. We had cars to tour the islands and
our accommodations, complete with inviting pools, were
perfect for out needs.
But back to the highlights of our trip: after an early
morning flight to Athens and an easy Metro trip from the
airport into the city, we found ourselves at the Economy
Hotel being told our reservations had been cancelled and
there were no rooms at the Inn. We were not pleased. The
problem was the Internet reservation service I had used.
Way back in January I had dutifully provided a Credit
Card number as guarantee, but that credit card was stolen
in Central America. The confirmation we got said the
credit card would only be used when we arrived at the
hotel so when a new card number was issued, I didn’t
worry. I should have.
The
reservation service accessed the defunct credit card five
days before we were to arrive and when it was rejected,
the reservation was cancelled without notifying me. Here
we were, six tired travellers, with no place to go. To
their credit, the Economy Hotel manager got on the phone
and got us rooms at the Omega Hotel nearby. It wasn’t a
five star establishment but the location in the central
market district was convenient, the beds were
comfortable, a good breakfast was included and they had a
roof top patio where we had drinks each evening watching
the sun set and the Acropolis light up.
We
saw nearly all the
antiquities in Athens and sampled lots of good Greek food.
Greece really is old. At home, anything over 100 years is
old, we have seen European antiquities of 500 years but
anything not created BC is new in Greece! We joined all
the other tourists to visit the Acropolis. It lived up to
its booking. We took lots of photos of the Parthenon and
the lovely Balcony of the Caryatids with the six ladies
holding up the roof. The Odeum of Herodus Atticus was of
especial interest as our youngest grandson is named
Atticus. This open-air theatre next to the Acropolis was
reconstructed in the 19th C and is used for concerts
during the August Music Festival.
We wandered through the
Ancient Agora, Athens’ commercial and civic center market
place during the 5th C BC. The Tower of Winds, built in
the 1st C BC in the Roman Agora, was a lovely combination
sundial and water-powered clock.
Cemeteries, with
their monuments to fallen heroes and wealthy citizens are
interesting to visit. We wandered through the Kerameikos,
the 4th C BC cemetery, built just outside the original
city walls. The Roman Emperor Hadrian, of the English
wall fame, left his mark in Athens. His library, which is
partially covered by three churches, remains. Hadrian’s
Arch, below the Acropolis, leads the way to the ruins of
the Temple of Olympian Zeus. The inscription on one side
of the Arch reads “This is Athens, the Ancient City
of Theseus” . The other side reads “This is the
City of Hadrian, not of Theseus” .
My
brother-in-law Jack received a GPS for Christmas a few
years ago and ever since has been chasing down geo-cache
sites. This is a new-tech treasure hunt locating
Tupperware boxes or plastic bags full of trinkets left by
others who managed to find the hidden cache using GPS co-ordinates.
Jack and Jenni downloaded instructions for several caches
in Athens and the islands so we helped him find a few in
the gardens of the Hill of Pnyx, next to the Acropolis,
and in the National Gardens. After crashing through the
bushes in the National Garden and still not locating the
cache, we left Jack on his own to complete his searches.
Ray and I managed to visit
the National Archaeological Museum. Our favourites were
the marble and bronze statues.
Huge marble Kouros statues,
larger than life nude men, stride off into the distance
with their arms straight at their sides. A bronze of a
small jockey on a horse seems ready to win the race. Zeus
(or Poseidon, depending on the current interpretation)
throws a thunderbolt (or trident) at an unseen target.
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